How we face death

One day a hospital teacher received a call asking her to visit a boy. She took his name and room number and talked with his teacher. “We’re studying nouns and adverbs in his class now,” the teacher said, “and it would be great if you could help him understand them so he doesn’t fall too far behind.”

The hospital teacher went to see the boy that afternoon. No one had told to her that he’d been badly burned and was in a lot of pain. Upset at the sight of the boy, she stammered as she told him, “I’ve been sent by your school to help you with nouns and adverbs.” When she left she felt she hadn’t accomplished much.

The next day as she went onto the ward, a nurse asked her, “What did you do to that boy?” The teacher worried she’d done something wrong and began to apologize. “No, no,” said the nurse. “You don’t know what I mean. We’ve been worried about him, but since yesterday, his whole attitude has changed. He’s fighting back, responding to treatment. It’s as though he’s decided to live.”

Two weeks later the boy explained that he had given up hope until the teacher arrived. Everything changed when he had a simple realization. He said: “They wouldn’t send a teacher to work on nouns and adverbs with a dying boy, would they?”

Hope matters. And in Thessalonians we see the distinctiveness of Christian hope, hope not just in this life but of eternal life, hope not just in heaven for those who die but of Christ’s return and the renewed recreated creation marked by the glory of God. In the Bible we see that Christ’s coming again and the promise of a new creation give us hope for living now with suffering and death in perspective. But what is our response to these truths, where does the rubber hit the road?

In Thessalonica there was a problem, what was it? They were worried about those who had died before Christ’s return; will they be resurrected, have they missed out?

Paul writes to encourage them to think rightly about death, the resurrection and Christ’s return. It is a response that is counter cultural; a typical inscription on a grave in Thessalonica would read: I was not, I became, I am not, I care not. But Paul wants these believers to know the truth and to live out their hope because of the promises of God!

1. What we believe gives us hope.(14)Paul uses the phrase “We believe...” and then explains the implications of that belief. What is it that Paul says we believe? “We believe that Jesus died and rose again...” Our hope is founded in the historical death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, a death that pays the wages of sin for us, and a resurrection that guarantees we’re made right with God and death is conquered.

Paul is quoting an early church creed which summarised their beliefs, similar to that used in 1 Cor 15: “For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep.”

Christian hope is not a vague wish it’s an historical certainty, anchored in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

And he goes on to point out the implication of that historical belief, because we believe that we also believe that he will come again, bringing with him those who have died in the mean time. Your friends haven’t missed out, those who die ‘in Christ” – believing and trusting in him are secure in him. They are in heaven now awaiting his return.
When Jesus returns the dead in Christ will come with him from heaven, their bodies will then rise – not as zombies but patterned after Christ resurrected physical body, the dead in Christ will be given their resurrection bodies(16), before the living are changed and united with our Saviour and them.

Again we see that it is Jesus presence that marks out these events, the dead are in Christ and with Christ, they return with him, and we are changed and caught up to be with the Lord, then and forever.

Paul reminds the Thessalonians of what the bible teaches about death, heaven, the last day and eternity. The dead are secure and with Christ now in heaven, and they w ill not miss out; they will return, and share in our ultimate hope in new physical resurrected bodies in a new creation with Christ for eternity. Doctrine matters! Knowing what the bible teaches matters because otherwise we’ll be like the Thessalonians uninformed, doubting and responding to death and living life wrongly.

2. Hope applied
Paul applies the doctrine he has reminded them of here – doctrine – truth is never the stuff of academia in the bible it is truth to set your living by. Here we see it in two main applications:

a. Grieve differently.  How does the world grieve? Like all is lost, without certainty. But not you says Paul, believers grieve differently, why? Because we know the truth of what we believe and Christ’s historical resurrection means we know there is life beyond death, it means we trust God’s promises. Notice it does not say that we do not grieve – but that it is distinctly Christian grief, resurrection grief, grief for our loss but not without hope.

b. Encourage one another -Secondly he says we encourage one another. What is it we encourage one another with? (18)”these words”. The truths he has just reminded them of; not vague niceties about going to a better place but the concrete realities of the death and resurrection of Jesus our Saviour and its implications for those who trust in him. We remind each other of the basis of our hope and the certainty of Christ’s return, and the nature of death for the believer – they have “fallen asleep in him.”

We need to grasp that – we are never short of something to comfort and encourage those have lost a believing son, daughter, father, mother, sister, husband, wife or friend with.

Our hope is God in all his glory; an intimate, unalloyed, unbreakable relationship with the God of glory in all his splendour, holiness and majesty where every moment of every hour for eternity is bathed in his glory and we are transformed to perfectly reflect and irradiate his glory. That is our hope! It means now we will want to investigate, to dig into, to unearth, to mine the truths of God’s glory through his word so that we increasingly desire his coming, so that we pray “Come, Lord Jesus”, so that the joy of the gospel hope that is ours by grace inform our joyful living looking for our Saviours return.